


The Other Side of Scars

by bluestalking



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Community: kink_bingo, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-06
Updated: 2013-08-06
Packaged: 2017-12-22 15:22:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/914819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluestalking/pseuds/bluestalking
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Would you prefer I got naked first?” Bruce asked.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Other Side of Scars

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for: trauma, surgery/physical trauma, depression, explicit sex, mental health issues, suicidal ideation.
> 
> Best fill I could do for the body alteration/injury square of my 2013 kink bingo card!

The best thing to do on the wrong kind of mornings was not to look. Not at the clock, not at the wall, not out the window, not to see the messages people were almost always leaving. Not at the doorway, because someone might be standing in it wanting him to do things. The best thing to do was smother himself under the blankets and if he opened his eyes only open them up to the cloudy landscape of a pillowed comforter, morning light climbing through the stuffing.

There was something stabilizing in not being quite able to breathe. And about lying inside a cloud, with his back flat on a solid surface. It didn’t hurt that it was a cloud, either, because from _inside_ the cloud, he couldn’t see how far he was falling.

Today it wasn’t flashbacks, though. Not even any nightmares, not anything dramatic. He just woke up with a sharp, painful beat in one side of his brain, and a rock between his lungs, and arms and legs that felt like they weighed a hundred pounds each. 

No good. Under the covers. Hell with everything. 

He was a middle-aged man who couldn’t fly in airplanes or take things from strangers or, sometimes, walk down stairs because he’d get vertigo and start seeing the stairs peel away, nothing to stand on, and all there’d be was an endless, freezing, starry vastness that wanted to eat him alive.

Sometimes he couldn’t work. Building things had always saved him, and now, sometimes, in the middle of something loud and dangerous and delicate, his hands would jerk and his vision would black out and he would almost kill himself. It’d been a second away from happening. It’d been a second away from killing someone else, walking in when he’d lost control. No one would have thought it was an accident, if he did kill himself, and maybe everyone would have thought he was a murderer if someone else died. He would. But it would be an accident. 

He knew with his entire being how much he didn’t want to die in Afghanistan. He knew it so much his heart froze in New York, or—or in the _place_ cutting into New York. He didn’t want to die. He just didn’t know how he’d avoid killing himself without even trying.

This morning wasn’t flashbacks or nightmares, but he couldn’t get up. Nothing mattered enough to make him get up. Pepper was gone, not gone for the morning or gone for the week, but gone from him because she had some basic sense of self-preservation. Surprise, Pepper Potts was not stupid. He didn’t blame her, and he would rather she be safe. But she was still gone.

He couldn’t stand checking voicemails or emails from Nick Fury, who’d want to know how his break was going and if he was going to be _involved_ with them on any _future projects._ The thought of food was almost enough to get him up, so he could run to the bathroom as fast as possible and throw up. He was taking a little hiatus from being the visible face of Stark Industries—Pepper’s was prettier, and definitely more professional, even if she’d looked a little haggard for awhile there. And mostly the other _Avengers_ were _gone._

Mostly.

Tony was going to lie completely flat under his blankets forever.

Bruce said, “Hey? Tony? We were going to work on that project this morning?”

Tony thought for awhile about whether he wanted to answer or just pretend that he _was_ dead. He could play dead. 

He said, eventually, painfully, “What time is it _now?”_

“Eleven,” Bruce answered, somewhere across his room. In his room. Hateful.

“So it’s not too late for me to take a nap?” Tony asked. He was invisible, wasn’t he? And muffled by the blankets. That should have been enough of a hint. Bruce was smart. He could take a hint, Tony was sure.

Bruce sighed and creaked across the room. Bruce could read hints, so he was ignoring them. What a jerk.

“Can I talk to your face?” Bruce asked.

“Obviously,” Tony said. “I do have a face.”

“Great,” Bruce said. The blankets twitched back, a moment later, and Tony steeled himself against pulling them back into place. It was worse (and he felt stupider because of this), it was _worse_ because he wasn’t wearing a shirt, and all of the scars were showing. At least Bruce wasn’t young, and he was only really muscular part of the time, but that didn’t make up for it, did it? Different issue. Issues. Scar tissues, and so on.

Bruce didn’t seem perturbed—why should he? Men went topless all the time, and he’d seen scars before, and to be fair he himself turned up naked in a lot of weird places. All of which was reassuring, until he looked at Tony’s face, and his expression shifted.

“Mind if I sit?” Bruce asked. He kicked his shoes off as he spoke, and by the time they were off, Tony wasn’t sure how to say, _No, get out, never come back, I have to lie completely still under this blanket that cost more than everything you had in your bank account over the last year._ If he had a bank account.

“Sure,” he said instead, and found Bruce lying down next to him, on top of the covers, hands folded over his stomach.

“So,” Bruce said.

“Uh,” said Tony.

“I told you I’m not this kind of doctor,” Bruce said.

“Yeah, you really did,” Tony agreed.

“But I have to ask…”

“Oh, no,” Tony says. “No, you really don’t.”

“As performances go—”

“Please go away.”

“—I have to hand it to you—”

“Have you not heard that I don’t--?”

“You’re an even worse actor than you told me,” Bruce finished. “I have never seen anybody try so hard to pretend to be trying to look happy and come off as miserable as you. No offense, but you’re kind of a lousy host.”

“Seriously?” Tony said. “You’re serious. You’re right, you’re really _not_ that kind of doctor.”

“As advertised.”

“Do me a favor, fake Doctor Banner.”

“What?” Bruce asked.

“Go away.”

Bruce sighed and lay there and didn’t go away. Eventually, when being stubbornly quiet got tedious (and Tony realized it wasn’t going to have any effect), Tony said, “Why aren’t you leaving? What good is this sighing thing going to do you?”

“Maybe no good,” Bruce said. “I’m just worried about you, that’s all.”

“Doctor,” Tony said. “Bruce. You’re one of the most disgustingly sentimental people I’ve ever met. How do you just hang out in someone else’s bed saying crap like that in your friendly old man voice and not even have the indecency to get naked first?”

“Would you prefer I got naked first?” Bruce asked.

“Probably,” Tony said pointedly, and then realized he’d pointed without thinking. “Wait. Why?”

“No reason. I just like to know what’s hypotheticals in a given conversation.”

“I prefer most people to start off naked,” Tony told him. “Either it puts them at a disadvantage or it really facilitates the ill-advised sex. Win-win.”

“Ah,” said Bruce, and then nothing else.

“Are you still disgusted by my anti-puritanical lifestyle choices?” Tony wondered.

“Never was,” Bruce answered. “I was just thinking that I don’t know where I fall on the scale of disadvantage to ill-advised. I mean, let’s be fair, I also don’t know that a lack of pants would really disadvantage me if it came down to it.”

“It wouldn’t,” Tony said. “Trust me. And I mean that—across the board.”

“Hum,” said Bruce.

“You’re very attractive,” Tony explained. “And sometimes you’re a, what, five and a half ton sprinting trash compactor.”

“Nowhere near that,” Bruce said. “It’s mostly bluster. Attractive?”

“You _and_ the trash compactor,” said Tony.

This time the pause came before the sound. “Huh,” Bruce finally said.

“What’s up?” asked Tony. “If this is going to be a time-consuming revelation, maybe you can have it somewhere else. I was sleeping?”

“You were wallowing,” Bruce said distractedly. “Hey, saying I’m attractive, that doesn’t mean anything, right? I mean you can commit to that without, you know. Having any interest.”

“I’m always a little interested,” Tony said. “Except right now, when I’m dying of despair. Why aren’t you leaving?”

Bruce didn’t answer. Tony said, “Do you mean do I have a crush on the incredible Hulk?” Since it came out sarcastic, maybe, and since Bruce still wasn’t saying anything, Tony did him the favor of rolling over onto his side and looking at Bruce. “Am I being painfully obtuse?”

“Yes,” Bruce said. “Let me explain. You’re my type.”

“Uh,” said Tony. “No. I’ve seen Betty Ross.”

“Right, exactly,” said Bruce. “An incredibly intelligent, gorgeous brunette with a Ph.D. and daddy issues.”

“I have more than one Ph.D.,” Tony said automatically. “Hey, with the daddy issues.”

“Listen, I’m not _judging,”_ Bruce said.

“I’d like to see how _you’d_ deal with—”

“You really wouldn’t,” Bruce said. “Anyway. I like you. Also I think we’re friends, and you’re my teammate. So I’m concerned when you’re—this.” He waved his hand over Tony to indicate _everything._

“So you’re gonna climb in bed with me and make me feel better?” Tony asked, sounding both sleazier and more dubious than he’d intended. Which was what he got for trying too hard to sound smooth and put-together.

“Sounds about right,” Bruce said. “I can get you off without, you know, switching over.”

“Holy crap,” Tony said, still lying on his side and looking over at Bruce. “You know what? I’m going to say yes, here. It is weirdly like a dream come true.” Except maybe he wouldn’t mention that Bruce was only half the dream.

“Hah,” said Bruce. “Well, look, I already got you in a better mood. Don’t get all sad again,” he added hastily.

“It’s called _depression,”_ Tony said. “You can’t fix it with your bossy voice.”

“I know what it’s called,” Bruce said. “Here, let’s try this.” He rolled toward Tony and pushed him firmly back against his pillows. 

“There,” Bruce said a little breathlessly. Did he say that a little breathlessly? “Now you can lie here like you want, and I can go down on you like I want. Sound good?”

“Yup,” Tony said quickly, and then his heart started to practically beat its way out of his newly nearly normal chest while he remembered to _worry._ “Yeah, that sounds—hey, so what about kissing? Maybe we could try that on for size.”

“I don’t know,” Bruce said. “I’m not sure I’m ready for first base.”

“What—oh,” Tony said. “Oh, you’re j—” He tensed, for the first second or two of the kiss, and then let himself sink right down. Bruce Banner: not actually the world’s _best_ kisser, like there was a little gum action there that could get tweaked, but, wow. Wow. Well, that just felt—“Oh, fuck me,” Tony mumbled up into Bruce’s mouth.

“I’m assuming you’re not being literal,” Bruce murmured back, and then put his hands over Tony’s wrists and pressed down with all his weight. Tony’s breath stuttered, and Bruce bit Tony’s lip, and Tony yelped in a way that made him even more horribly anxious about the stages past kissing.

“Shh,” said Bruce, not seeming to mean it. He moved his hands to the sides of Tony’s face and concentrated on kissing him for awhile. Tony was nearly lulled by it, so it made him gasp and wriggle when Bruce’s hands slide down and his teeth nipped against Tony’s jaw.

“You can’t possibly not get off on getting someone off,” he gasped. “Or, if you can, I’m _so insulted.”_ The hazy misery and the bright points of fear both seemed dull (thick, also boring), next to Bruce’s warmth and rough but gentle fingers and his breath and his bites.

“Don’t be insulted,” Bruce reassured him. “I’m trying hard.”

Tony bit his tongue and tried hard not to say what he was thinking. He didn’t say anything for a couple of minutes, until Bruce and his hands and his mouth made it past Tony’s collarbone.

“You might want,” he started, but, what, was he going to warn Bruce that he was hideous? Presumably, Bruce Banner, genius scientist, could put two and two together.

“Definitely,” Bruce said. “Come on, Stark. People see me naked all the time.” He smiled, and he was joking, but Tony couldn’t get more than a stuttering cackle out of his throat.

“How nice for you,” he said, not thinking, not thinking about his words at all. God damn, did it have to be so _hard?_

“Not really,” Bruce said. He nudged the covers down, checking at every fresh inch that Tony didn’t want him to stop. “Is this what you’re worried about?” His fingertips brushed over the ugly scars of where Tony’s arc reactor had been. Of course they’re still ugly. With the best doctors in the world, it was hard enough to keep him alive, removing that thing. Tissue transplants and full life support, a clean room because he, unlike most people, could afford it. The gaping, panicking feeling of being _empty_ , of missing his heart like his keys. It had been two months before he even came home.

The scars were still raised and red; the whole area where the reactor had been was stretched and ruddy and foreign. He wondered sometimes when he saw himself whether he should have left it in, instead, just plugged it up and not gotten himself reconstructed. With his luck they’d need him again, need Iron Man, and they’d crack him right back open to get him running again.

The other scars were an afterthought, pale and smooth and some of them nearly invisible.

Tony realized he was making a sound that he couldn’t objectively categorize as good or bad. Bruce was choosing to hear _worrying,_ Tony thought, watching him frown like there was a problem to solve, watching him press his mouth against the scars and press his hands against Tony’s ribs, on both sides of him, like he was soothing an anxious animal. Which, although Tony didn’t like the comparison, maybe he was.

“I’m not, I’m not,” Tony gasped, and Bruce sat back fast. “No,” Tony said. “I don’t mean stop. I mean—hey, twenty years ago, were you a tabloids kind of guy? You read a lot of dailies?”

Bruce raised his eyebrows.

“I just would like to know what you’re expecting?” Tony said. “You know. Out of me. Depending on how far down you’re planning to take that very lovely mouth of yours, hah.”

“Oh!” Bruce said loudly. “Oh. Right. Yeah! I think I know what you’re talking about. Sorry. I kind of forgot, but yeah, I know that.”

“You forgot,” Tony answered weakly. He could feel his arms going numb already.

“The exact nature of your genitals isn’t my top concern,” Bruce said. “Hasn’t been. Listen, I am extremely bisexual. I’m sure there are people out there who are looking exclusively for some monster cock--”

Tony choked.

“—but I’m trying to get in your pants, right now,” Bruce finished. “Specifically. What’s that noise for?”

“Monster cock,” Tony says meaninglessly.

“Yeah, I know,” Bruce said, rolling his eyes. Tony wasn’t sure they were talking about the same thing. “Okay. Can I take your pants off?”

“Sure,” Tony said. “Sure. As long as you’re really not looking for _monster cock.”_

“I’m taking your pants off,” Bruce told him.

It had been a seriously long while since Tony had his pants off in front of someone who wasn’t a doctor (a real doctor, not in a sexy dress-up doctor). Not since Killian, but it hadn’t been often after New York, either. Tony spent more time chasing Pepper out of bed with violent nightmares than luring her into it.  
Well. That wasn’t true. He lured a lot. It just usually ended with crying.

Maybe it had been long enough, now. Maybe it was that Bruce hadn’t been hurt because of him. Maybe he’d just given up. Anyway, he didn’t panic when Bruce’s hands brushed firmly down his sides, over his hips, pushed him down and bit a startling little line down Tony’s stomach. Tony moaned and leaned back into the covers and nearly cried after all when Bruce’s tongue pushed between his legs.

Bruce said, “Come on, Mr. Great-and-Powerful.” He rolled Tony over, pushed him down on his elbows, tugged his hips up, nudged his knees apart. Tony was panting before Bruce had even _done_ anything, and then Bruce’s tongue pushed in and he was screaming into his pillows.

Too long. Too embarrassing.

But Bruce’s hands were all over, soothing and electrifying, holding him together, holding him up, while he licked and fucked and sucked and Tony cried and shuddered against the bed, feet kicking, lungs seizing.

“Shh,” Bruce murmured against him. “Good. You’re doing good.” He pulls back enough to laugh at himself and say, “Sorry. This isn’t me telling you that you know how to have sex.”

“I’m not doing much,” Tony gasped.

“Trust me, you are,” Bruce retorted, so light that Tony knows it’s serious. He leans back on one elbow to see. It stretches his skin, but he ignores that.

“You need to let go a little?” he asks.

“I need _not_ to.”

“Okay,” Tony said. “Okay. Just asking, because—”

“The Hulk is _not_ going to make you come,” Bruce said.

“Yeah, all right,” Tony said. “So you make me come, and then I handle the Hulk.”

“Don’t be crazy,” Bruce said sharply. 

“Don’t be mean,” Tony shot back. “Listen, the green guy saved my life. I don’t think he’s going to try to hurt me.”

“He doesn’t have to _try,”_ Bruce said. “I can just _stop_ if you want.”

“Don’t stop!” said Tony. “Just, if you can’t hold him in—you know. Let him out. The floors can take it.”

“I don’t think—”

“If you don’t mind any of this, why should I mind you?” Tony wondered.

“Because you’re not a killing machine,” Bruce growled.

“Well,” Tony said. 

Bruce stops short of saying, _It’s not the same._ He nods, and says, “I don’t want to hurt you accidentally. And I don’t really love the idea of him—”

“What?” Tony asked. The numb cloud in the middle of his chest makes it easy to talk with his ass in the air. “ _Not_ giving you an excuse for eternal celibacy? What, do you and the Hulk just go jerk off in the Canadian Rockies or something? Frighten the elk? Roar into the morning Sun?”

Bruce looked so embarrassed that Tony felt a little bad for guessing well.

“Maybe just not on the bed,” he suggested. “Hulk might be a little heavy.”

Bruce stared, and then shook himself, and then rolled Tony over again. “All right,” he said. “Let’s try again.” He put a firm hand to the back of Tony’s neck, and very deliberately pushed him to the floor. Tony gave up on graceful almost immediately. He realized that he didn’t even know what the bedroom floor was made of. Something expensive. It was cold and his skin stuck to it. He was so dizzy with want that he saw everything more than once, like a fan opening up. Bruce put him on his back, forced his knees apart, and slid his tongue down Tony’s clit like they hadn’t stopped.

“ _Fuck,”_ Tony gasped. “Fuck. Language. So bad. Bruce, don’t stop. I’ll kill you. Shit.” He kept blabbering until Bruce slid a finger in. First it hurt (he was too out of practice, he was too _tight_ ) and then filled him up and dragged in all his attention until his ears were ringing and all he could do was feel Bruce feeling out the shape of him. Bruce was red and sweating and concentrating so hard Tony thought he would hurt himself.

“It’s—okay,” he managed. “It’s okay, it’s okay.”

“Not,” Bruce muttered. “Can’t fuck you the—other way. Finger’s too big.”

“Oh, _fuck,”_ Tony said, and his vision whited out, and he felt himself slamming hard against Bruce’s hand, felt the nips of Bruce’s lips, felt himself tightening around Bruce’s finger over and over until he fell back hard against the floor, throat raw.

“Fuck,” he said. “Fuck. Look at you. You look miserable.”

“I’m not,” Bruce said. “I’m—”

“You’re, uh,” Tony said, “you’re wrong about the finger. Trust me, I’ve thought this through.”

“You’ve _what?”_ Bruce said.

“Thought it through,” Tony said. “Yes, Bruce, I have definitely had fantasies. And I’m so scientifically minded. Love the details. Please shut up. Just—a couple more of yours first, and then—seriously, just—”

“Oh, god,” Bruce said feelingly, but he was breathless and his hands were shaking, and he braced himself on Tony’s hip and did it. Tony groaned, and pushed himself up into Bruce’s lap, and fucked himself on Bruce’s fingers until he felt loose and wet and completely unsatisfied.

“Come on,” he gasped. “Come on, pull one out and do it while you’re inside.”

“Oh, _god,”_ Bruce said again, barely making words. He pulled out a finger, fumbling and dazed, and changed so fast that Tony barely had time to relax himself. Bruce’s finger was huge and hot and it expanded inside him so fast it knocked the breath out of him.

“ _Fuck!”_ Tony shouted, biting it out through his frozen lungs, and then looked up at the Hulk, gasping. He was spilling out of Hulk’s lap, Hulk’s free hand wrapped around his waist, Hulk’s anger and intensity pouring over him. He was in Hulk’s lap. He could _feel_ it. He writhed, and Hulk cricked his finger. Tony shuddered and decided the smart thing was to be still. He went still.

“Good,” Hulk said.

“Hnnngh,” Tony said carefully. “ _We_ good?”

Hulk snorted and pulled his finger out. Tony yelped, and found himself pushed out of Hulk’s lap onto the floor. He loomed over Tony and Tony shivered and writhed, and Hulk said, “Your mouth now, shorty.”

“That’s how I know you like me,” Tony said, eyeing Hulk’s cock. He almost wished it was Bruce; he had a flash of guilt, that even if they did this thing twice, or more than twice, it’d probably never be Bruce. But, then, nothing was perfect. Or, if it was, it was CEO of Way Out Of Your League And You Will Totally Screw That Up. Which was the wrong thing to think about at this moment, on many levels.

He looked up, and Hulk was watching him, brows bending into a deeper and deeper frown.

“Oh, yes,” Tony said. “Oh, god.” He slid down and put his hands on Hulk’s cock, both hands, his mouth, his tongue his teeth. He felt like laughing and screaming a little and he was so turned on he couldn’t sort it out from the nerves. Five and a half tons. Bruce said no, but Tony’d had plenty of opportunities to make Jarvis check. 

He was so focused on what he was doing and what he was thinking that Hulk’s knee between his legs shocked a shuddering whimper out of him. _Keep going,_ he told himself. _Keep going._ It didn’t take that much urging. The only reason he could want to stop was the natural kernel of fear that he was going to kill himself.

He reminded himself to explain that to Bruce, if he had to. The difference between being afraid of killing himself, and being afraid of Hulk killing him. 

Hulk’s hand pushed down against his chest, then, fingers splayed against him for a moment before jerking back.

“No!” Tony said. Hulk growled. Tony said, “No, I—are you afraid you hurt me? I’m fine, okay, pal?”

“Shorty better not lie,” Hulk rumbled. His hand settled again Tony’s shoulder, so gentle it hurt. _Where does that even come from, Mr. Nothing-But-Rage?_ Tony wondered.

“You want this?” he asked. Because maybe it was only Bruce after all.

“Hulk. Wants,” Hulk said clearly, glaring nearly through him. 

“Let’s switch,” Tony said. Hulk huffed a laugh and rolled them over, and when the world stopped spinning Tony was on top. He climbed around so he was straddling Hulk’s stomach. (Trying. Not really.) “You’re one hell of a gorgeous big green monster, you know that?” he asked. Hulk growled, and Tony thought he was pleased, maybe. Good.

Tony bent his head and curled his toes, and when Hulk rumbled under him, he clenched his legs with pleasure. It was easy, even easier than he remembered, to see how Hulk was Bruce and wasn’t Bruce, and how his friend—the rude, clever, relentlessly attentive companion in the lab—was the same as his savior. Rude, clever, relentlessly attentive. Endlessly angry. Tony could relate, if fear was relatable to anger.

Hulk’s hand on his back startled him, but he only stretched under it like a cat, until Hulk’s fingers reached around his chest and pressed there. He bit down accidentally, and Hulk roared shortly and squeezed him a little, and Tony said, “Sorry! Don’t smash, please.”

Hulk growled. “Hurt, here?” His fingers, on Tony’s chest.

“Y...yes,” Tony said. “Not as much as the alternative. Alternatives. Not that much now.”

Hulk’s huge hand ran down Tony’s leg and he moaned, face mashed up against Hulk’s thigh.

“Hulk doesn’t get scars.”

“Sure you do,” Tony said. “Sure you do. We all get those. Or you wouldn’t be alive.” 

Which was a risky thing to say. But Hulk only grunted and petted, gentle and then rough until Tony’s jaw ached and his throat pinched and his arms shook, and all he wanted was to come again. He wanted the Hulk to come, and he was sure he could make it happen, and the thought was so overwhelming that he wanted to cry.

“Good little human,” Hulk grunted. He strained against the floor, and the room creaked around them, and Tony sobbed against his cock. 

“Closer,” Hulk said. Tony’s whole body could feel him speak.

“Oh,” Tony said. “Oh. Yes.” Breathless and boneless. He climbed up, the length of Hulk’s cock between his legs. “Ohgod, ohgod, oh, yes.” He started rocking before Hulk grabbed his arms, started crying out and fighting without fighting before Hulk started using him, jerking himself off against Tony’s body. Tony used his hands, graceless and useless, body shuddering with every rough motion below him and against him.

“Good, good, good, good,” he gasped between breaths. He was so wet and weak that he wasn’t sure he would make it after all. He might just have died right here, given up halfway because it was actually too much. But Hulk kept him on a string, dragging out his arousal until he was crying against Hulk’s heaving chest.

“ _Good,”_ Hulk agreed, and his hands clamped around Tony’s arm and his waist, and Tony felt him come, hot and violent and, oh, god—Hulk’s finger swiped at Tony, dipping inside, and Tony came, too, sobbing and screaming and completely out of his own control.

He came close to blacking out, if he didn’t black out altogether. When he could open his eyes again, he was curled against the floor, Bruce under him, looking sheepish and irritated and very messy.

“Oh,” Tony said.

“Okay?” Bruce asked. There was a little red on his cheeks. That was good. That probably meant he was more embarrassed than annoyed.

“Okay is the wrong word,” Tony said. He couldn’t make the consonants happen exactly how he’d planned them. Interesting. Not that interesting. His bed was so high up.

“Good?” Bruce asked, looking extremely dubious.

“So fucking good,” Tony said. “Don’t be a jerk, Banner. You just got seriously laid. Don't be a jerk to me or the big guy.” He struggled upright, and glared noncommittally at the bed.

“Help you up, old man?” Bruce asked.

“A jerk,” Tony told him. Bruce got up and heaved him to his feet. They looked at each other for a moment’s silent conference, and both climbed into bed.

“Gross,” Bruce points out.

“Rich,” Tony answered, just to be horrible. Bruce, sure enough, elbowed him in the ribs.

But after a minute, Bruce said, “You made that—very easy. You know—being both. It was weird.”

“But nice weird, right?”

“I—yeah. Nice weird. I guess so,” Bruce said.

“Great,” Tony said, and yawned. “I swear I’ll let you get me out of bed later. I swear I will pretend to be a productive member of society for at least—half an hour, at some point today.”

“Deal,” Bruce said. “Deal. Sounds great.”

Tony looked over at him and his shut-off little expression. Tony smiled.

“I showed you mine,” he said. 

Something (Tony knows what) slid away and slithered off and left Bruce looking bemused and tousled and happy.

“Mine’s bigger,” he said.

“Shut up, Banner,” Tony said. He turned onto his stomach and tucked his cheek against Bruce’s shoulder. Bruce tugged up the blankets. Back into the clouds. But, hey. That was an acceptable place to go, if you knew you wouldn’t be alone coming out of it.


End file.
